"Do introduce us, Brett," Finn said easily. "I don't think I caught this gentleman's name from before."
"This is Toby Goddammit," said Brett. "There's probably a highly amusing christening story somewhere in his background, but don't expect to hear it from Toby. He has no sense of humor and even less small talk. Not noted for his subtlety, or his charm, and vicious with it. Toby's the one you hire when there's a shortage of mad dogs. Living proof there's no intelligent life on his planet of origin. What's the problem, Toby?"
"He is," said the thug, jerking his shaggy head at Finn. "I don't trust him. I don't care what he says, or what you say; once a Paragon, always a Paragon. This is some kind of trick, or trap; has to be. And if they're all too stupid or too greedy to recognize that, I'm not. You shouldn't have brought him here, Brett. I thought you had more sense. Now get out of the way. You'll all thank me for this later. Say good-bye, Durandal. You're a dead man."
His hand came up, suddenly full of a long gleaming blade with a viciously serrated edge. Finn made a slight gesture with his hand, and Rose Constantine erupted up out of her chair in the corner, where she'd been sitting still and silent for so long that everyone had quite forgotten about her. Toby started to turn, but she was already upon him, and her sword flashed through the air in a blindingly swift arc. It sank deep into Toby's neck, and the impact of the blow drove him to his knees. He cried out once, his eyes wide with shock and pain, while blood gushed down his shoulder and across his heaving chest. Rose set her foot against his shoulder, and jerked the blade free. Toby grunted, a deep helpless sound, like a cow in a slaughterhouse. Rose hit him again, and the blade sheared clean through his neck. The head fell away, rolling across the floor towards the other agents, who scattered away from it with cries of alarm, like startled birds. The head's eyes were still blinking, and its mouth worked soundlessly The headless body fell forward onto its chest, and lay still. Rose sighed happily. A shocked silence fell across the room. Finn emerged from the booth and smiled charmingly about him.
"You have to be strict, but firm," he announced.
"I want to go home," said Brett, from under the table.
But they still had one last visit to make. To see Dr. Happy, and his fabled subterranean chamber of stinks and perfumes. You could only get to it by descending through a trapdoor, and making your way cautiously along an underground passage with sulphur-smeared brick walls that was home to far too many rats and other small scuttling things, and finally through a series of state-of-the-art air locks. Dr. Happy was not a genuine medical person, as far as anyone knew for sure, but he certainly knew his chemistry. Whatever you wanted, or thought you needed, Dr. Happy had the cure for what ailed you. Love potions and battle drugs, mind benders and soul destroyers; from the sublime to the suicidal, from heart's ease to potions that would blow the doors of perception clean off their hinges, Dr. Happy was right there for you.
Brett looked interestedly about him as he followed Finn and Rose into the good doctor's laboratory. He'd never been able to afford the doctor's more than extortionate prices, and he was curious to see if all the rumors were true. His fingers itched to steal something. Anything.
The laboratory was a long single chamber, carved out of the solid rock the city rested on. The bare walls were covered with what looked like miles of transparent tubing, stapled directly to the stone, all of them pulsing with the many-colored liquids streaming through them. Tables groaned under the weight of the very latest in scientific equipment, some of it straight from some poor fool's development benches, who probably didn't even know it was missing yet. Dr. Happy never had any trouble getting what he needed, whether the price for it was credits or in kind. There were computers, gene splicers, recombinant chambers, and a huge walk-in refrigerator absolutely packed with alchemical magic.
The man himself was almost impossibly tall and willowy, a spindly scarecrow figure in his stained and battered white lab coat, topped by a long thin face with bulging eyes and a frankly disturbing toothy grin, under a shock of white hair that seemed to stick out sideways from his head. He giggled a lot, and bit his fingernails when he got excited. His eyeballs were as yellow as urine, and his teeth weren't much better. He smelled strongly of something. Brett wasn't sure of what, but did his best to keep upwind, just in case. The good doctor bobbed happily along beside Finn as they strolled through the chamber, pointing out his various wares and processes like a proud father.
"Such a pleasure to have you here, sir Durandal! Such a pleasure, yes! I've heard so much about you. One does hear things, you know, even this far underground. Don't touch that, Brett. I knew you'd come to me eventually, sir Durandal. Everyone does, you know. Everyone! Oh, you'd be surprised who I've entertained down here, in my time… I have it all here, you see. Such stuff as dreams are made of… in pill and liquid form. Don't touch that, Brett. I have potions here to drive a man mad with lust, or grow hair on an elephant. I can drive sane men out of their minds or cure the crazy. Make the blind see and the deaf hear, and make a cripple take up his bed and walk even if he didn't have a bed when he came in here! I have potions to give you emotions they don't even have names for yet, to show you heaven and hell and everything in between. Every day I think the unthinkable, and nothing is ever too extreme! Brett, if I have to speak to you again I will spray you with something really amusing."
"Brett, behave yourself," said Finn. "Or I'll let him do it."
Brett thrust both his hands deep into his pockets, and did his best to look innocent. He wasn't particularly successful. Rose had found a table to lean against, her arms loosely folded across her chest. She looked bored.
Dr. Happy sneered at them both, sniffed moistly, and turned his toothy smile on Finn Durandal again, his bony hands clasped tightly together over his sunken chest.
"So; what sweet and sour miracle can I perform for you, sir Durandal? Hmm? Something to make a corpse sit up in his coffin, or make his widow dance? Something to make an angel curse or a demon repent? Just name your needs, sir Durandal, and I will supply them in an instant! Yes!"
Finn waited patiently, letting Dr. Happy witter on until he ran down. "They tell me you are a collector as well as a creator," he said finally. "A connoisseur, of the rare and strange. That you have access to drugs that no one else has. Old drugs, from the days before the Rebellion. They say, in fact, that you have drugs from the private collection of the infamous Valentine Wolfe himself."
Dr. Happy's hands flew to his mouth, his eyes appallingly wide, and he stamped a foot, all but squeaking with excitement. "Yes! Oh yes! Oh sir Durandal, you have come to the right man indeed! I have them, I have them all, even the lost sex drug that mutates a man's flesh… rare and wondrous substances, some so potent even the smell of them would unravel your DNA or tie knots in your chromosomes. What, exactly, did you have your heart set on, sir Durandal?"
"The esper drug," said Finn. "That's what I want. The drug that can make a man more than a man."
Brett looked around, startled. Even Rose looked interested. The esper drug had been banned for almost two centuries. As well as being permanently addictive, the fatality rate had proved to be a hell of a lot higher than previously believed, killing or maddening over 80 percent of those who took it. There were still a few scientists studying it, of course, under very strict conditions. It was far too potentially useful a drug to be just abandoned. But there was an understandable shortage of volunteers willing to test it. You had to be really desperate to buck those kind of odds. Brett looked curiously at Finn. Surely he wasn't crazy enough to take the drug himself? Well actually, he probably was that crazy; but he wasn't stupid.
"I have the drug, yes," said Dr. Happy, his great goggling eyes blinking furiously. "Very rare, very dangerous. I have it in the pure form. Just a few drops, to make you a telepath, a polter, a precog. Make you an esper, or kill you. Most probably kill you, in fact, in horrible, horrible ways. Closed coffin, no flowers by request, very sad. Very strange chemical structure… almost certainly alien i
n origin… but oh, the potential, if we ever solve the fatality problem." He smiled sweetly. "Such wonders lie within the human mind, waiting to be unleashed."
"I'll take it," said Finn, cutting ruthlessly across Dr. Happy's eulogy.
The good doctor shrugged. He was used to that. Few people really appreciated him. He wandered off in the direction of his refrigerator, reaching out to pat some of his favorite pieces of equipment along the way, like trusted pets.
"What the hell do you want with the esper drug?" Brett said quietly. "You're not planning to take it yourself; are you?"
"Oh no," said Finn. "I have no intention of taking it myself."
Most of the Paragons who'd come to Logres for Douglas's Coronation had decided they might as well stick around for the marriage too. It was only a couple more weeks, and they so rarely got a holiday. Let the peacekeepers earn their pay for a while. Only ever really at ease in the company of their own kind, the Paragons spent most of their time sitting around in a bar called The Sangreal, swapping ideas and experiences and increasingly tall tales about past cases. Drinking was heavy, boasting was rife, and one-upmanship was rampant. Food and drink was in constant supply, the best of everything, and of course no one ever asked them to pay for anything. They were Paragons, after all. It was an honor to have them there, eating and drinking and carousing the host out of hearth and home.
The Sangreal used to be a cop bar, patronized almost exclusively by Parliaments security staff, since the House was only just up the road; but the Paragons just moved in en masse and took over, and absolutely no one felt like arguing about it. The security people took to sulking in a slightly less salubrious bar just down the street, and did their best to ignore the cries of jollity and good cheer emmanating from what used to be their place. The Sangreal's owner sighed, bit the bullet, and smiled on his new customers till his cheeks ached. He was, after all, making a nice little earner out of selling his security cameras' footage to the gossip shows. Coverage of Paragons in their cups always guaranteed a good audience.
The Paragons also attracted groupies in great numbers, men and women and everything in between, looking for autographs, good stories, sex, a spot of hero worship, or just to hang out in such excellent company. The Paragons tolerated them, as long as they didn't make a fuss and paid for their own drinks. Some nights the bar was so packed with gorgeous men and women that you couldn't get in the front door unless someone breathed in to make some room. The bar's owner hired extra staff, paid them danger money, learned not to wince when his furniture got broken up, and kept the place open twenty-four hours a day. People came and went, drink flowed like it was going to be made illegal tomorrow, and the party never ended. There was singing and dancing and much fondling of bare flesh, and always a fight or two going on somewhere, because living legends just couldn't turn down an opportunity to test how good certain people really were. Since they were Paragons, the duels were nearly always entirely good-natured, and rarely needed the regeneration machine the owner had installed out the back, just in case.
The joint was jumping when Lewis Deathstalker walked in, even though it was early in the afternoon. The air was thick with smoke and general bonhomie, and the din was deafening. Someone had started a poker school, and someone else was losing loudly. A woman dancing on a table was taking her clothes off very slowly, to general approval. One Paragon was painting a mural on a wall. Another was urinating in the cuspidor. A group in a corner was singing a bawdy drinking song, while another group was lurching back and forth before them, fondly imagining they were dancing. The Paragons, the King's Justice, the best of the best; pissed as farts and twice as useless. Lewis considered the damage a terrorist could do just by lobbing a grenade through the door and running like hell, and then decided he was better off not thinking about things like that. He was sure someone was on guard. Somewhere.
Lewis paused just inside the doorway, looking about him. No one paid him much attention, even in his specially designed black leather armor. In fact, this was probably one of the few places he could go and not be immediately approached and fawned over. Here, he was just another Paragon. Or rather; he used to be just another Paragon. He was the Champion now, like it or not. Lewis deliberately pushed that thought aside, and slowly made his way through the crush of the crowd, heading for a familiar face he'd spotted at the bar.
He needed to be among friends and colleagues. People he could talk to. People who would understand.
Veronica Mae Savage, Paragon for Tiger Mountain (a Rim world famous for possessing neither mountains nor anything remotely like a tiger)
was leaning against the bar with a pint glass in her hand, holding forth to a group of handsome and well-bred young men, who were hanging on her every word and laughing loudly at jokes they shouldn't even have been able to understand, if they were really as well bred as they seemed. In fact, one of them was demonstrating how he could use part of his anatomy as a swizzle stick. Veronica Mae spotted Lewis approaching, bellowed his name above the din, and beckoned him over with an accommodating wave. The good-looking young men reluctantly made room for him next to their heroine, and she leaned precariously off her bar stool to kiss him loudly on both cheeks.
"Well, well, look who it isn't! Lewis bloody Deathstalker, his own bad self! Looking good, Lewis… sit down with me and have several drinks. One of these boys will pay. If they know what's good for them. Good boys, good boys… and such excellent taste. Got anything you want signed, boys? I sign anything, up to and including body parts." She drank thirstily from her tall glass and then blinked owlishly at Lewis, ignoring the froth on her upper lip. "Love the black leather, Lewis. It's so not you. Want to see my piercings?"
Lewis allowed one of her groupies to buy him a cold beer, and sat down opposite Veronica Mae. The other groupies pressed as close as they could, to make it clear they had no intention of being excluded from the conversation. Veronica Mae grinned sloppily with her pale pink mouth, a woman of medium height and more than a little stocky, with a broad face under a mass of golden curls, held down by a big floppy tam-o'-shanter. It had been twenty years and more since she left her homeworld of New Caliban, but she still wore the heavy tweed cloak of her upbringing. She'd brightened up her Paragon's armor with extra steel spikes and studs, and wore a knuckle duster on her left hand. Even in bed. Savage by name and by nature, Veronica Mae was past her best years, but as yet no one had worked up the courage or deathwish to tell her that. She'd come to her post relatively late in life, and next to Finn was the longest-serving Paragon in the Empire.
"So, Lewis; what are you doing here?" Veronica Mae said flatly. "Been… what, four years since we worked together on the firejewels mystery, out by the Burning Waterfalls? Five years? Jesus, where does the time go? Anyway; didn't expect to see you here. Didn't think you'd want to mix with us lower orders anymore. Not now you're the Imperial Champion." Lewis shrugged uncomfortably. "I'm still a Paragon at heart."
"You're the Champion," Veronica Mae said forcefully. "King's bodyguard. And good luck to you; always said you were a better choice than the Durandal. Worked with him once. Never again. Humorless bastard. Got all huffy, just because I put my hand on his knee. Pretty face and a really nice arse, but no fire in his boiler. All he cares about is looking good for the media. What are you doing here, Lewis? This is a Paragon bar."
"Just thought I'd talk with" some old friends," said Lewis, trying to keep it light. "Catch up on what's happening. You know; just hang out." Veronica Mae looked at him, almost pityingly. "You're not a Paragon, and you're not a groupie. What other business could you have here, Lewis? Go back to the Court. Or Parliament. That's where you belong now. Champion. Now if you'll excuse me, me and the boys have some serious drinking and revelling to do. Not necessarily in that order. Isn't that right, boys?"
The boys agreed loudly, and almost came to blows over who's turn it was to light her cigarette. Lewis nodded stiffly, and moved away from the bar. He wandered through the crowd, smiling at familiar faces, but
wherever he went he heard the same thing. These people, who had once been his friends and his peers, many of whom had fought and bled beside him, no longer saw him as one of their own. They were always polite, even friendly, and some of the younger faces were even a little awed by his famous career and legendary name; but in small and telling ways he was made to feel like an outsider, and not entirely welcome. He had moved on, they intimated, and left his old friends behind. This was a Paragon's bar… and he had no place there. It was all very courteous, but no less definite for that. No one actually turned his back on him, but they might as well have. Lewis felt excluded. Isolated and alone, even in the middle of a crowd. When he finally gave up and quietly left, no one even noticed.
He found another bar on another street, quiet and almost deserted, and retired to a private booth at the back with his own bottle of wine, to do some serious thinking. He'd gone to The Sangreal hoping for a little friendly advice; but not for the first time, it seemed he'd have to sort out his problems on his own. He couldn't talk to Douglas. Or rather, he could, but he didn't want to. He'd always found it embarrassing to discuss financial matters with someone as rich as Douglas Campbell. And he couldn't talk to Anne, because she'd go straight to Douglas. Lewis poured himself another glass of Elfshot, the wine so golden it almost glowed in the gloom of the booth, and glowered into it.
Du Bois had cut off his allowance. Virimonde's Member for Parliament had sent him a curt little note, saying that the monies raised by public subscription would be paid instead to Virimonde's next Paragon, as soon as one was chosen. In the meantime, Lewis was the King's Champion, and so he should look to the King for financial support in future. It wasn't an entirely unexpected blow, not after their last conversation, but it still hit Lewis hard. Over the years, he'd become used to relying on his planet's backup stipend. His wages hadn't changed now he was Champion, but he'd had to move to a new apartment, in the very best part of the city, so he could be close to his work. By rights he should have had his own rooms in the Court, right next to Douglas's; but it had been so long since there'd been an Imperial Champion that the details were still being worked out. In particular, whether the King or Parliament was responsible for the Champions expenses.